Illinois Municipal Retirement Fund Raises Position in F5, Inc. $FFIV

Illinois Municipal Retirement Fund raised its position in shares of F5, Inc. (NASDAQ:FFIV) by 19.9% during the 3rd quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 28,173 shares of the network technology company’s stock after acquiring an additional 4,671 shares during the quarter. Illinois Municipal Retirement Fund’s holdings in F5 were worth $9,105,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other institutional investors have also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Norges Bank bought a new stake in shares of F5 during the second quarter valued at approximately $207,492,000. Nordea Investment Management AB lifted its position in F5 by 217.7% during the third quarter. Nordea Investment Management AB now owns 229,591 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $74,142,000 after buying an additional 157,318 shares during the period. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. lifted its position in F5 by 503.9% during the third quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 163,525 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $52,850,000 after buying an additional 136,445 shares during the period. Treasurer of the State of North Carolina boosted its holdings in shares of F5 by 223.2% during the 2nd quarter. Treasurer of the State of North Carolina now owns 140,547 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $41,366,000 after buying an additional 97,057 shares in the last quarter. Finally, First Trust Advisors LP grew its position in shares of F5 by 5.8% in the 2nd quarter. First Trust Advisors LP now owns 1,615,555 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $475,490,000 after buying an additional 87,923 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 90.66% of the company’s stock.

F5 Stock Up 4.5%

Shares of NASDAQ FFIV opened at $273.93 on Friday. The firm has a market cap of $15.48 billion, a P/E ratio of 22.66, a PEG ratio of 7.42 and a beta of 1.00. F5, Inc. has a twelve month low of $223.76 and a twelve month high of $346.00. The company has a 50 day moving average of $266.74 and a 200 day moving average of $285.17.

F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV) last issued its earnings results on Tuesday, January 27th. The network technology company reported $4.45 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.63 by $0.82. F5 had a return on equity of 22.08% and a net margin of 22.45%.The business had revenue of $822.47 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $755.97 million. During the same period last year, the business posted $3.84 EPS. The company’s revenue was up 7.3% compared to the same quarter last year. F5 has set its Q2 2026 guidance at 3.340-3.460 EPS and its FY 2026 guidance at 15.650-16.050 EPS. As a group, equities analysts expect that F5, Inc. will post 11.2 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, insider Lyra Amber Schramm sold 199 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, February 3rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $281.37, for a total transaction of $55,992.63. Following the sale, the insider owned 177 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $49,802.49. This trade represents a 52.93% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. Also, EVP Thomas Dean Fountain sold 1,297 shares of F5 stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, February 10th. The stock was sold at an average price of $278.32, for a total transaction of $360,981.04. Following the completion of the sale, the executive vice president owned 8,060 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $2,243,259.20. This represents a 13.86% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. Insiders sold 20,301 shares of company stock worth $5,204,053 in the last three months. 0.48% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Analyst Ratings Changes

FFIV has been the subject of a number of recent research reports. Piper Sandler reissued an “overweight” rating and set a $325.00 price target (up from $295.00) on shares of F5 in a research report on Wednesday, January 28th. Wall Street Zen downgraded shares of F5 from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Friday, November 28th. Zacks Research upgraded shares of F5 from a “strong sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Friday, January 9th. Barclays upped their price target on F5 from $267.00 to $283.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Wednesday, January 28th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised F5 from a “neutral” rating to an “overweight” rating and raised their price objective for the company from $295.00 to $345.00 in a research report on Thursday, January 15th. Five research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, six have given a Hold rating and two have given a Sell rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $309.89.

Key Headlines Impacting F5

Here are the key news stories impacting F5 this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Zacks Research raised several near‑term and multi‑year EPS forecasts for F5 (including FY2026–FY2028 and certain quarterly tweaks), which supports upside to consensus earnings expectations and helped sentiment. Zacks estimates summary
• Positive Sentiment: Institutional buying reported in Q4 (notable positions added by Northwestern Mutual, Norges Bank, Deutsche Bank and UBS) signals strong fund conviction and may underpin the share price. Institutional ownership details
• Positive Sentiment: F5’s January quarter earlier this year beat EPS and revenue estimates and management set FY26 guidance above some expectations — a fundamental driver supporting the recent rally. Quarterly results and guidance
• Neutral Sentiment: Short‑interest reporting for mid‑February shows anomalous zero values in some feeds (likely a reporting glitch); treat the strange numbers cautiously and rely on the January short‑interest snapshot instead.
• Negative Sentiment: Multiple law firms have filed or are soliciting lead‑plaintiff claims in a securities class action alleging F5 misled investors about security issues in its BIG‑IP products (claims reference an alleged long‑term undetected intrusion). The Feb. 17 lead‑plaintiff deadline is driving a cluster of notices and heightening litigation risk and reputational uncertainty. Hagens Berman filing GlobeNewswire notice
• Negative Sentiment: Clustered insider selling disclosed Feb. 10 (including sales by the CTO and multiple EVPs) can spook investors even if sales are for diversification/liquidity — review the Form 4s for context. SEC Form 4

F5 Company Profile

F5 Inc (NASDAQ:FFIV) specializes in application services and delivery networking, helping organizations ensure the availability, performance and security of their applications. The company’s core offerings include advanced load balancing, traffic management and application security solutions designed to optimize user experiences and protect against threats such as distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks and web application exploits.

At the heart of F5’s product portfolio is the BIG-IP platform, which provides a suite of software modules for local and global traffic management, secure web application firewalling and DNS service delivery.